Part I. The Creed: The Faith Professed

Part I. The Creed: The Faith Professed

Chapter 1. My Soul is Yearning for You, My God (Ps 42:2)

To be human is to search for God. Throughout history, to the present moment, religious beliefs and practices express the human search for God. As creatures made in God’s image and likeness, each one of us has been given a mind to search for the truth and a heart that longs for unconditional, forgiving love. These basic human desires are ultimately fulfilled in God, who is truth and love. Read more....

Chapter 2. God Comes to Meet Us

By natural reason, we can know God exists with certainty on the basis of the created world. Revelation is the love and knowledge of God that we cannot possibly arrive at by our own powers of reason. Out of divine love, God has chosen to reveal himself to the world. God’s self-manifestation is the personal revelation of the mystery of his plan of salvation. The plan of divine revelation begins with creation and is perfectly fulfilled in the sending of God’s own Son, Jesus Christ, for the redemption of the world. Read more....

Chapter 3. Proclaim the Gospel to All Creation (Mk 16:15)

Christianity is a religion of the ‘Word of God’, a living and Incarnate Word. In Apostolic Tradition and in the books of Sacred Scripture, God speaks to humanity in human words that are the ‘speech of God as it is put down in writing under the breath of the Holy Spirit’ (CCC, no. 81). Just as the Word of the eternal Father, Christ Jesus, took human flesh, so are the words of God expressed in human words in the Sacred Scriptures. Read more....

Chapter 4. Bring About the Obedience of Faith

God’s revelation of love in Christ Jesus – in the power of the Holy Spirit – for our salvation, offers the possibility of a human response. Faith is the human response to God, who reveals. For Christians, faith is a free response of assent to the revelation of God, revealed in the Trinity of persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The Christian life is a relationship that begins with God’s revelation in Christ Jesus and our response in faith to that revelation. Faith is a concrete gift from the Holy Spirit, who plants the seed of faith within us, nourishes and strengthens our faith and brings us to perfection in it. Read more....

Chapter 5. I Believe in God

We begin the Christian Creed by professing belief in God, the ‘Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth’. This is the starting point for the whole symphony of Christian belief – in God, who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. All the other articles of the Creed depend on the first article of the Creed and give concrete meaning to it. The mystery of God who is a Trinity of Persons is the central mystery of Christian faith and life. Read more....

Chapter 6. Man and Woman in the Beginning

The Bible opens with these words: ‘In the beginning God created heaven and earth’ (Gn 1:1). The first three chapters of the first book of the Bible focus on creation: its origins and destiny in God, its beauty and order, the creation of human beings, the drama of sin and the hope of salvation. Read more....

Chapter 7. The Good News: God Has Sent His Son

‘For this is how God loved the world: he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life’ (Jn 3:16). The heart of Christian belief is the incarnation of God in the person of Jesus Christ, who we believe is the Son of God sent into the world. Read more....

Chapter 8. The Saving Death and Resurrection of Christ

The Paschal Mystery is the saving death and resurrection of Jesus for the redemption of the world. It is a core Christian belief that by his death on the cross and his resurrection from the dead, Jesus overcame death and sin. The Paschal Mystery of Christ offers to each of us the fruits of his redemptive work and stands at the centre of the Good News of the Gospel. Read more....

Chapter 9. Receive the Holy Spirit (Jn 20:22)

The Holy Spirit is God, the third divine Person of the Trinity, sometimes called the Paraclete, an Advocate and Comforter, the Lord and Giver of Life. At the Last Supper, Jesus promised to send the Holy Spirit: ‘I will send him to you’ (Jn 16:7). After his death, resurrection and ascension into heaven, Jesus sends the Holy Spirit upon the Church to inspire, strengthen and vivify God’s people. Read more....

Chapter 10. The Church: Reflecting the Light of Christ

The word ‘Church’ (Latin ecclesia) originally meant a gathering or assembly. In Christian usage, the word ‘church’ refers to the worshipping community, the local community (or ‘parish’) and the entire universal community of believers (CCC, nos. 751–752). Read more....

Chapter 11. The Four Marks of the Church

In the words of the Creed, we profess ‘one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church’. These four characteristics, or ‘marks,’ affirm the essential features of the Catholic Church, her origin and her mission in the world. The Church does not possess these characteristics; rather, we believe that it is Christ who, through the power of the Holy Spirit, makes his Body, the Church, ‘one, holy, catholic and apostolic’. Read more....

Chapter 12. Mary: The Church’s First and Most Perfect Member

Catholic beliefs about Mary and the saints are based on what is believed about Jesus Christ and the Church. Christ Jesus, as the Son of God, is fully human and fully divine. And Mary, the Mother of the Son of God, occupies a special and unique place in God’s plan of salvation. Read more....

Chapter 13. Our Eternal Destiny

God ‘wants everyone to be saved and reach full knowledge of the truth’ (1 Tm 2:4). God’s desire for the salvation of every human person is the basis for our reflections on death, judgement, heaven, purgatory, hell and eternal life with God. Only in light of God’s unfailing offer of friendship and covenant love do we best understand Catholic beliefs about the ‘Last Things’. In light of Jesus’ victory over death in his resurrection and ascension we have the certain hope of our eternal union with God. Read more....